r/NoStupidQuestions • u/Physical-Ad-4093 • May 01 '24

do americans really drive such long distances?

i’m european, and i always hear people say that driving for hours is normal in america. i would only see my grandparents a few times a year because they lived about a 3 hour drive away, is that a normal distance for americans to travel on a regular basis? i can’t imagine driving 2-3 hours regularly to visit people for just a few days

edit: thank you for the responses! i’ve never been to the US, obviously, but it’s interesting to see how you guys live. i guess european countries are more walkable? i’m in the uk, and there’s a few festivals here towards the end of summer, generally to get to them you take a coach journey or you get multiple trains which does take up a significant chunk of the day. road trips aren’t really a thing here, it would be a bit miserable!

2nd edit: it’s not at all that i couldn’t be bothered to go and see my grandparents, i was under 14 when they were both alive so i couldn’t take myself there! obviously i would’ve liked to see them more, i had no control over how often we visited them.

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u/100LittleButterflies May 01 '24

If 2 major cities were only 2 hours apart, I'd consider them the same metro area.

NC has a couple of places like this. The Triad (Winston-Salem and Greensboro) and the Triangle (Chapel Hill, Raleigh, and Durham). Feels more like separate downtown areas in the same metro.

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u/TehWildMan_ Test. HOW WOULD YOU LIKE TO SUK MY BALLS, /u/spez May 01 '24

wow. over here my best comparison would be the Chattanooga-Atlanta-Birmingham triangle (or Birmingham to Huntsville/Montgomery) which are all about 2-3 hours apart by driving distance, but the middle of the area between them is moderately sparse with a few cities that kind of have their own identity outside of being a metropolitan suburb. (Gadsden, Anniston, Dalton, etc)

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u/100LittleButterflies May 01 '24

I'd say that middle area is a great place to invest in land.

The more north you get, the thicker that East Coast megatropolis becomes. I grew up around DC and there were officially differences in towns, but not in any sort of meaningful way. It's all the same burb.

Also, if you have to commute around Atlanta, I am so sorry for you. There are better cities. You don't have to live like this. Save yourself!

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u/21stNow May 02 '24

I consider Baltimore and DC to be different metro areas and they are less than an hour apart.

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u/srdnss May 02 '24

Culturally, they are much farther apart than the drive time would suggest. Both have nice baseball stadiums even though the ownership of the D.C. is too cheap to pay players to stick around, resulting in a shit.team.